Not all style conventions make sense at first glance. Or second. Or ever. For instance, who thought up the idea of putting periods and commas inside the quotation marks whether or not they are part of a quotation?
Other rules that have a stated logic are based on distinctions so subtle or tenuous you suspect that someone is just messing with you: Washington State, but state of Washington? Swiss Gruyère, but swiss cheese?
It’s not surprising that writers sometimes feel like chucking the style book into the recycling. But understanding the reasoning behind a convention is an excellent antidote to frustration, and today I’m going to tackle an important one that continues to flummox writers: that is, why note and bibliography entries have different styles, and why that makes sense. We’ll use Chicago style, since that’s what I know. Mack Maccio, Zamboni Repair in the Home (Chicago: Bizbooks, 2002). Maccio, Mack. Zamboni Repair in the Home. Chicago: Bizbooks, 2002.
Note style:
Why the difference? To begin with, notes are usually written like sentences, so putting the first name first is natural reading order. Since periods signal the end of a sentence, they would be confusing in the middle of a note citation. Instead, the elements are separated by commas and parentheses. Try it: read the following note the way you would any sentence.
23. For more on getting rich quick, see Mack Maccio, Zamboni Repair in the Home (Chicago: Bizbooks, 2002), 42–56; and Dora Gump, Effie Thompson, and Clara Stubee, Counting Your Way to Blackjack Bucks (Las Vegas: HustlePub, 2009), xii.
On the other hand, when you go to a bibliography, you expect to scan a list in alphabetical order. Putting the names in natural order would make that awkward. Instead, names appear as they would in an index, with the last name first. In a list it’s clear where a citation begins and ends, so periods may be used to separate the elements. Gump, Dora, et al. Counting Your Way to Blackjack Bucks. Las Vegas: HustlePub, 2009. Maccio, Mack. Zamboni Repair in Your Home. Chicago: Bizbooks, 2002.
Bibliography style:
In another method of citing called the author-date system, the forms also make sense. In the text, works are cited concisely by (what else?) author and date (Maccio 2002), leaving the reader to find the full citation in a reference list at the end of the article or book. Maccio 2002 is easier to find if the dates are moved to the front. Gump, Dora, et al. 2009. Counting Your Way to Blackjack Bucks. Las Vegas: HustlePub. Maccio, Mack. 2002. Zamboni Repair in Your Home. Chicago: Bizbooks.
Reference list style:
I often preach that styles rules are flexible and made for breaking, but there are times when a style makes so much sense it would be dumb to flout it. Citation styles help readers absorb complex information. Learn one and you’ll gain polish and clarity in your work—and big sloppy kisses from your copyeditor.
Hmmm ... in the last Maccio entry in red before the final paragraph, should the 2002 be repeated at the end? I think you want period after Bizbooks there, no? I only notice bc I'm reading carefully in an attempt to get my darned Zamboni back together and out of my living room!
Posted by: John Deever | 12/08/2010 at 07:25 AM
Aack! Thank you, John--I fixed it. I hope the Zamboni instructions had a better proofreader!
Posted by: Carol Saller | 12/08/2010 at 07:38 AM
I almost didn't say anything, bc wouldnt subverting a subversive make me ... a reactionary? A totalitarian? Can't have that -- I always enjoy your writing and your tips! Thanks, and now I'm off to return to "Stimulating Smallholder Investments in Sustainable Land Management: Overcoming Market, Policy, and Institutional Challenges." (Any tips on tons of complex equations created in Equation Editor dumped into Word files? I can't do the math, I just want to hand this off to the comp with as few equation & Symbol font gremlins as possible!) -John
Posted by: John Deever | 12/08/2010 at 08:14 AM
Carol, I'm new to your blog, so forgive me if you've addressed this before. You mention you condone the flouting of style rules in certain cases. What's your thinking on how that consistency? I'm a big consistency freak. Cheers~
Posted by: Nancy Goll | 12/08/2010 at 08:33 AM
You ask "who thought up the idea of putting periods and commas inside the quotation marks"? Who indeed? This is a convention which I discovered recently (after 25 years as a writer, editor and publisher in the UK). I was commissioned to write a book by an American publisher who asked me to write things such as "This is a quotation." with the "." in quotes rather than "This is a quotation". with the "." outside.
I was told that this practice is encouraged by various august manuals of style. How, then, had I never noticed it before? I asked among some writer and copy editor friends and none of them had heard of this convention either. Further research reveals that this is a US/UK difference. American writers prefer punctuation inside quotations (this is called either "conventional" or "aesthetic" punctuation). In the UK we prefer punctuation outside quotations unless it forms a part of the quotation (this is called "logical punctuation").
In "Modern English Usage", Fowler rails against the American convention. He says, "The conventional system flouts common sense, and it is not easy for the plain man to see what merit it is supposed to have to outweigh that defect."
I must admit that I tend to agree. I don't lose sleep over the punctuation which my American publisher insists that I put into quotations. Even so, I don't like it. As Fowler says, I really can't see the sense in it.
Posted by: Huwcol | 12/08/2010 at 08:41 AM
Welcome, Nancy, and thanks for the question. When you break a style rule, you can break it consistently--although I can think of times when I would tolerate inconsistency for a good reason.
This is a good idea for a post. I'll try to write more on it soon.
Posted by: Carol Saller | 12/08/2010 at 08:50 AM
From what I understand, the "conventional" system (which applies only to periods and commas; all other punctuation marks are everywhere written using the "logical" system) arose in the days of hand typesetting, when the thin pieces of type metal that held a period or comma could easily get misaligned following the closing quotation mark.
Posted by: John Cowan | 12/08/2010 at 09:40 AM
It looks like part of what you are saying here is that complex rules make style look inconsistent. Such as in the case of the placement of dates in your examples, or the placement of punctuation in relation to quotes. (The complex UK rules can look inconsistent.)
In my work, manuscript peer reviewers often comment that our use of practice/practise is inconsistent and admonish our sloppiness. I guess they haven't opened many dictionaries.
Posted by: Scieditor | 12/08/2010 at 09:41 AM
I'm confused about why parentheses are used to enclose publication information in notes and not in the bibliography. I understand the alphabetizing difference. That makes total sense to me. But such a major change in format between a note and a bibliographic entry seems unnecessary. Can you explain why this is the convention?
Posted by: Emiddlebrookherron | 12/29/2010 at 10:04 AM
I cannot. I imagine that the bibliography form came first, and that parentheses were added to the note form because periods were counterproductive. So much of style is arbitrary, not logical (see first part of post). It's maddening, but that's why we need to keep our style guides at hand.
Posted by: Carol Saller | 12/29/2010 at 10:12 AM
I actually prefer the parentheses because they separate the publication information. I'm a rare books curator, and in cataloging we generally use the parentheses. Sometimes, especially with manuscripts and early printed books, the publication (or production, for mss) information is sketchy. It helps to have a special little cubby in which to put everything one can find. I must admit that I usually use that form in bibliographies, perhaps because I've been using it in cataloging for so long. I am filling out Ph.D. applications right now, though, and am updating my publications list with the proper format.
Thanks for answering my inquiry, Carol. Happy New Year!
Posted by: Emiddlebrookherron | 12/29/2010 at 10:15 PM